After a decade, “The Simpsons” are returning to China. The planned opening of a Simpsons stores in Beijing in March and Shanghai after three months is considered by western media as a surprise because of the love-hate relationship between the popular cartoon American family and China.
Despite the 26-year-long cartoon being known for the bratty and mischievous antics of Bart, the son of Homer and Margie Simpson, it also delivers commentaries on various global events, and China has not been spared, noted BBC.
The British news portal cited as an example a Season 16 episode when the family went to China to help a relative adopt an infant. Their plane passed Tiananmen Square that had references to the 1989 massacre. These are an image of a tank and a sign that reads “On this site, in 1989, nothing happened.
The satiric humor utilized by Matt Groening, the man behind the long-running series, did not escape the eyes of Chinese censors who banned the cartoons in 2006. By then, “The Simpsons” had been airing in China for about six years, a decade late since the show aired in 1990.
“The Simpsons” also had an episode that touched on Tibet, which the cartoon depicted with images of the region’s Chinatown surrounded by barbed wire. Lisa, Bart’s genius sister, is a supporter of the Free Tibet movement.
Some Chinese viewers admitted in Zhihu, a Q&A forum in China, that many of them do not understand or appreciate American humor that the cartoon uses to delivery serious messages in funny, but subtle ways. Other users said the Simpson satire got lost in translation.
Like other industries, such as the smartphone and movie, which has recognized the vastness and importance of the Chinese market, the makers of “The Simpson” want to benefit too selling merchandise of the yellow-haired cartoon characters.
On Friday, 20th Century Fox announced the opening of “The Simpsons” merchandise store in Beijing in March and Shanghai in June. The China stores are among the 100 outlets globally that the company would open in the next few years, said Jeffrey Godsick, president of 20th Century Fox Consumers Products, reported Mashable.
The two flagship stores would have 250 square meters of floor space and sell up to 200 licensed Simpsons items such as clothes, stationery and phone cases. The opening of the two stores was preceded by the return of “The Simpsons” on Chinese TV in 2014.